There was a somewhat surreal atmosphere at Labour's annual get together in Liverpool. For the first time in in a very long time delegates were able to meet knowing that the tensions of leadership battles and plotting to overthrow the leadership simply weren't there.

The sun was shining and Liverpudlians made delegates welcome, maybe encouraged by suggestions that the city's economy would benefit to the tune of £15 million as a result of such a mass gathering coming to Merseyside.

Yet for all this, there was an air of concern among both the platform politicians and the delegates in the hall.

As we watched the main speeches from the conference stage, the key issue was undoubtedly the economy, with Shadow Ministers falling over themselves to attack the Government for lacking a plan to take the country out of its economic doldrums, accentuated by the poor economic and jobs news coming out from across Northern England all week.

The conference met in the context of news that Merseyside constabulary, facing cuts worth £66 million by 2015, was looking at the prospect of having to lose 113 police officers, a concern shared by one off duty police woman I spoke to, from Liverpool, who was off to a fringe event on the future of UK policing.

Was there a narrative? Ed Miliband makes his keynote speech Photograph: Jonathan Hordle / Rex Features

In Greater Manchester, the week saw an announcement of the 33 police desks earmarked for closure in an effort to save money. Across the Pennines in Yorkshire, there was a stark warning from the Labour leader of Leeds City council, Keith Wakefield about the impact that cuts are likely to have on the vulnerable across the region.

In the North East, it was announced that Redcar and Cleveland council would be consulting on shedding 80 jobs as a result of financial pressures. And then came the biggest and most harshly-felt news that a combined total of almost 3,000 jobs were to be lost across Lancashire and Yorkshire from the defence company, BAE systems.

Set against a background of such bleak news of cuts and job losses, it would seem almost unimaginable that an opposition, faced by a Government overseeing such devastating cuts could possibly fall behind in the popularity stakes. Yet on the morning of Ed Miliband's big speech came the news that polling by ComRes for the Independent had the Conservatives leading Labour.

It is important to add the caveat that polls come and go and little can be concluded from one set of numbers, not least given that just a day later, YouGov had Labour returning to a modest lead. But that aside, the ComRes polling seemed to crystallise a sense of disappointment in Ed Milliard's speech and frankly a lack of policy detail to match the rhetoric, with the bars of Liverpool soon afterwards filled with Labour activists in a distinctly downbeat mood.

They felt that the clarion call lacked a coherent narrative that would appeal to the much-vaunted 'centre ground' of British politics. And not just that. At a fringe event on Tuesday evening, Gideon Skinner of the polling firm Ipsos Mori had a clear message for Labour – Ed Miliband the man wasn't yet cutting the mustard and or crystallising in the minds of the British public the idea that he might really ever walk into Downing Street as Prime Minister.

And on economic credibility, despite the unpopularity of the Government's cuts agenda, Labour was clearly facing a serious specific problem in the polls, trailing the Conservatives when it came to respondents' confidence on which party would best manage and steer the economy. The message was clear: Labour can't just expect the coalition to fail and for people to come flocking back to the party. It needs a positive alternative to attract new voters.

There was also a sense that Miliband's speech, with the booing that echoed around the conference hall at the simple mention of Tony Blair's name, that the party was being steered slowly but surely away from the middle ground of British politics towards a more left leaning path, a place where the talk includes terms such as Miliband's 'predatory capitalism.' This led to an outbreak of concern from party members at the possible take-off of a kamikaze mission by the still relatively new leader of the Labour party, a view supported by much of the Northern press.

The mood around conference had certainly improved by the time the exhibitors began packing up today. Pre-conference opinion polls had put Labour behind the Conservatives. After this week, spirits were rising. The unseasonal sunshine might have had something to do with that, but Mr Miliband's upbeat speech on Tuesday also played its part. MPs want to like him and support him, but they are anxious for him to get more, and better, exposure. That won't happen until he starts setting out the policies that will define him, and capture the public – and media – imagination.

Labour may be ahead in the polls, but there are few other bright spots on the party's horizon as it gathers in Liverpool for its annual conference. After all, considering that the Government is making unprecedented cuts in public spending and struggling to provide any sort of strategy for economic growth, it is remarkable that the coalition is not far more unpopular than it actually is and that Labour is not reaping far greater advantage. Indeed, when it is remembered how capitalism was found wanting as the global financial crisis unfolded, the failure across Europe of parties of the Left to benefit from this is striking.

It is Ed Miliband's unenviable task to remedy this, to show how Labour can become relevant again and to demonstrate that, when taxation is stifling the economy and there is no money left to spend, the party can put forward a viable alternative to its traditional tax-and-spend solutions.

In this, Labour is still failing badly. Rather than look at the reasons why Labour policies resonated so powerfully with the public as the party won three consecutive elections, it seems that many of those meeting in Liverpool would rather hark back to a mythical golden age of trade-union power in which the party was the doughty defender of a working class that now no longer exists. He might be the most successful leader Labour has ever had, but it is a safe bet that no one will use the conference platform to hymn the virtues of Tony Blair.

Speaking on Sunday to the BBC's Andrew Marr programme, Ed Miliband admitted he still had a long way to go to make it back to Number 10. Based on this week, the distance probably hasn't got any smaller.

What do you think? How did Labour's conference go down across Northern England? Has it altered your perceptions of the Labour party? Ed Jacobs is a political consultant at the Leeds-based Public Affairs Company and devolution correspondent for the centre-left political and policy blog, Left Foot Forward.